


Stealth Son

by MagicalDragon



Series: Queer Headcanon Fics [5]
Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: Aromantic Sherlock Holmes, Gen, Hate Crimes, Queer Gen, Queer Themes, Trans Male Character, Trans Sherlock, Transphobia, more like aro-spec/grey-aro but understandably this is the tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-02
Updated: 2018-10-02
Packaged: 2019-07-20 10:44:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16135607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MagicalDragon/pseuds/MagicalDragon
Summary: “You're right, by the way,” Sherlock tells Gregson after the case is over.Gregson looks up at him from his desk.“About my insistence on not misgendering Ethan Phillips being affected by more than open-mindedness on my part,” he elaborates. “You've been wondering about it since I deduced his gender.”





	Stealth Son

When Watson walks in on Sherlock for the first time, it's a challenge. Not for him, but for her. It's designed that way. Everything from the girl who just left to his memory exercise, even - especially, if he's being honest - his bare chest, with its tattoos and scars. Of course, Watson takes it all in stride, as he comes to know she does most of his challenges. Her eyes linger on his scars for little more than a few seconds before moving on. She doesn't mention it. If she had, he's not sure he'd have let her come with him to his crime scene, Brownstone be damned.

It does come up later, because of course it does. She's trying to get to know him. A fool's errand, but she is persistent. If he'd given her more, Sherlock doubts she would have gone there, but as it is, her frustration at him wins out against polite acceptance.

“Those scars on your chest,” she says. “They're mastectomy scars.”

“They are,” he merely says.

“Is that what-” she begins but he interrupts her in annoyance.

“I transitioned when I was enrolled at Oxford, not while I lived in London.”

“Of course you attended Oxford,” Watson scoffs and Sherlock latches on to the chance to redirect the conversation.

“I didn’t attend, I was merely enrolled. I can’t say many of the lectures were worth showing up for, although the university library was quite useful.”

“Sherlock,” she says.

She’s not going to let him stir them away; of course she isn’t.

“I assure you, Watson, my drug use had nothing to do with my gender status. In fact, heroin is known to lower testosterone levels, so had the use been meant to lessen dysphoria, that would have been an extraordinarily bad way to go about it, yes?”

“I know all that,” Watson says. “I was a doctor, remember? But perhaps that was the point.”

Sherlock nods a couple of times as he takes in her meaning.

“So you imagine it a form of self harm, a way to punish myself for being what I am?”

“Maybe,” she says, more unsure, now.

Sherlock sighs as he rolls his eyes. Of course. What else could a transgender person do than suffer for their transgenderism? Against better judgement, he’d expected better of her.

“I have work to do, Watson.”

Blessedly, she leaves him to it.

 

As a child, Sherlock pays gender no mind. It’s simply irrelevant to him, no matter how much those around him insist that he care. His mum indulges him and calls him a tomboy with affection in her voice when he prefers practical clothes to pretty dresses and insects to dolls. He takes after her, she say, and he loves that. His father, as always, doesn’t pay attention. Whenever he gives Sherlock presents, they’re aimed at his idea of what a little girl might want, not at what Sherlock might want. It’s so obvious. Not that Sherlock doesn’t enjoy using his dolls to play out elaborate mysteries, he does, but a dad who’d been paying attention wouldn’t have made that his gift.

He starts to realise in the middle of puberty. Boarding school has always been miserable, apart from a few treasured teachers, but he can’t say all the girls and half the boys adding “lesbian” to their list of insults is especially heartening. It’s illogical to think there’s something wrong with being a lesbian, he argues, which just makes his tormentors laugh harder. He hasn’t liked changing rooms since his puberty started, but now he stares into the wall whenever he’s changing, too, just to avoid accusations of looking at anyone else.

It’s summer when he figures it out. After the countless taunts during the school year, he’s on his computer trying to figure out if he really is a lesbian. He isn’t. The acronym has four letters - many, many more in other constellation, he later realises, but these four are the foundation - and when he reads up on the last one, something clicks into place. He is transgender. Transitioning is too much work, he decides, when gender really is such an irrelevant factor, but he knows himself, now. That helps.

His conviction that he’s above changing his body merely because society’s ideas don’t match up with his own last into adulthood, but not much longer. With the generous allowance his father grants him while he’s still supposedly studying, Sherlock goes to a private clinic and gets testosterone. Next time Mycroft visits him, he looks him up and down, lifts an eyebrow and says:

“You really ought to inform your family when you decide to change gender, Sherlock. It is still Sherlock?”

“It is,” he says.

“That’s a relief, at least,” Mycroft says as he makes himself comfortable on Sherlock’s couch. “Might make it easier to get father onboard.”

“I don’t need him onboard,” Sherlock snarls.

“Oh, I think you will, if these surgeries cost as much as I think they do.”

Sherlock hates that he’s right.

 

Watson doesn’t mention it again, not even when she meets Ms. Hudson. She looks at him in a certain questioning way, but doesn’t voice what must surely be on her mind. That neither he nor Ms. Hudson is cisgender is a coincidence, of course. It’s simple statistical probability that one of his associates would be transgender, too. Though Sherlock won’t deny that he feels a certain kinship with Ms. Hudson, he’s not in the habit of picking his associates based on their identities. Sherlock isn’t even sure if Ms. Hudson had been aware of their shared societal status for much of their early acquaintanceship. They speak of it only after a transphobic comment at her expense makes Sherlock blow up at the offending cop. After that, she’s curious.

“Doesn’t it get weird working with cops, knowing how they treat trans people?” She asks.

“I suppose so, yes,” Sherlock says. “There are many reasons I’m not a policeman, but the simple fact that I hold very little faith in the institution itself is an essential one. I tell myself that with my dedication to the truth, I can counteract some of the corruption, but…”

“You don’t always believe it,” Ms. Hudson says and he nods.

“For those times, there are private clients.”

Ms. Hudson nods too and sips her tea as she contemplates.

“Do you live stealth?” She asks.

He does. The only other people who know are his family and anyone he sleeps with. There’s no Watson yet, no Irene, not even a Gregson.

“I ask because it’s not an option for everyone. I often pass, but my build makes it impossible to do so reliably. You’re lucky to even have the option.”

Sherlock taps his fingers together repeatedly and bites his lip.

“You’re wondering if, when not everyone can, and those who can’t are those particularly in danger from the police and other authorities, it’s right that I do so?”

“I am,” she agrees and sips her tea. “I get it, though. I’m not a political crusader, either. After all, didn’t we go through all we did to be left alone? And it’s not any of my business. I just think it’s a worthy question to ask yourself.”

Sherlock keeps tapping, then gets up.

“It is.”

 

Gregson finds out before Watson, before there is a Watson. It starts with a case, a homicide. A woman killed in her own apartment, or so he’s told. They tell him a name, too, but he erases it soon after he arrives at the scene. It takes less than a minute for him to realise that what he’s been told is wrong.

“She's been stabbed to death,” he's told by a detective and without even thinking, he corrects it:

“He.”

“I'm sorry?” Gregson says, ready to jump to his detective’s defense.

“ _Mr._ Phillips was transgender,” Sherlock says.

“How can you possibly know that?” asks another detective, while Gregson just looks at him.

“His body bears the marks of someone who recently started hormone replacement therapy,” Sherlock says and crouches down next to the body. “Adult acne, the beginnings of fat redistribution and, if I'm not mistaken, some subtle stubble.”

Gregson and his team stare at him.

“None of that means... “ Someone starts.

Sherlock rolls his eyes and gets up, walking over to the kitchen.

“Also,” he says and points at a magnet on the fridge. “That's the trans pride flag.”

Some of the detectives express further doubts. Sherlock has some himself; not about Phillips being transgender, but about his identity. There is some probability that Phillips was non-binary, after all. As soon as they get ahold of the victim’s roommate, who had been at her girlfriend's place, it becomes clear that Sherlock was right.

“Ethan was nervous when I left,” she tells them. “I think he was about to come out to someone, but I’m not sure who… he… he didn't want to talk about it… “

She breaks down crying and they give her a few moments to gather herself.

“If you could provide us with a list of Mr. Philips’s acquaintances, it would be very helpful to our investigation,” Gregson tells her and she quickly complies.

It was obvious what had happened. A coming out gone wrong. Most likely culprit would be any sexual partners Phillips might have had. Trans panic? Trans and gay panic in one? Sherlock readily shares his views on the matter and it doesn't take long before a tall, thin young man with scratches on his hands and bags under his eyes is taken into custody. Unstable, angry. Bad at lying. He'd stabbed again and again. Lawyer might try an insanity plea. Trans panic is still a legal defense in New York. Sherlock hopes they don't go there.

“You're right, by the way,” Sherlock tells Gregson after the case is over.

Gregson looks up at him from his desk.

“About my insistence on not misgendering Ethan Phillips being affected by more than open-mindedness on my part,” he elaborates. “You've been wondering about it since I deduced his gender.”

“It's none of my business,” Gregson says, without meeting Sherlock’s eyes.

He's uncomfortable. Because of what Sherlock is or because he was caught wanting to pry? Embarrassed posture suggests the latter, but he can't be sure, not yet.

“You’re correct, it really isn't,” Sherlock agrees, “but you might as well know, should it prove pertinent to another case.”

Gregson nods and now he's meeting Sherlock’s eyes, earnestly. “Thank you for telling me.”

Despite himself, Sherlock finds that he cares very much about Gregson’s opinion. He doesn’t need Gregson’s approval on something he decided to act on many years ago - hell, he didn’t really need anyone’s approval back then, either - but it is nice to have it, nonetheless. He has a lot of respect for Gregson. The man had done little to suggest his position on trans issues one way or the other, so while Sherlock had been sure coming out to him wouldn't involve any overt drama, he hadn't been sure what to expect. Subtle acceptance is a good result, all in all.

 

One of the freeing aspects of being with Irene is how little she cares. Sure, Sherlock can somewhat reliably predict whether someone will be amenable to sleeping with him regardless of his genital structure, but Irene isn’t just a one night stand or a friend with benefits. She is everything.

“Huh, well, that’ll be new,” she simply says when he tells her his circumstances before she resumes kissing him.

Funny, really, how a criminal mastermind responsible for countless deaths can be more progressive than most people Sherlock interacts with. Of course, he's now certain Irene must have already known when he told her, but that doesn't change how effortlessly she treats it throughout their relationship.

When she doesn't respond to any of his communications after their first night together, he worries. It's not the first time he's been some sort of experiment. But Irene is special and so he tries and is rewarded. He admits the worry he had on a cold winter morning, wrapped together with her. She chuckles, kisses him and reassures him as he's allowed no-one to do since his mum died and he loves her so desperately.

Where Irene became Moriarty, Watson became everything. Not in the same sense as Irene - he's never had any romantic interest in Watson, for one - but perhaps in a realer sense. So much about Irene was carefully planned to appeal to him. He'll never know how much, of course, but some part of him suspects this is why he could feel the way he did about her when he’s never had similar feelings before or after; she wasn't real. Watson is so very real, in everything she does. She challenges him and supports him and loves him and he loves her more dearly than anyone else and, despite society's insipid preference for romantic love, it's much realer than how he loved Irene.

 

It’s years later when Sherlock has his second trans-related case. After Kitty. Kitty, whom he never told. Never got around to. Now he can’t. It doesn’t matter.

This time the trans person is not the victim, but the accused. A local politician is dead and the prime suspect is the young trans woman who called it in. She’s his secretary and says she found him there, lifeless on the floor, when she turned into work. It’s not that Sherlock doesn’t understand the thought process that lead Gregson’s detectives to suspect her, but... the only suggested motive is the idea that she killed this man for “finding her out” and it’s infuriating him. They already sent her to the station.

“You’re all wasting time!” Sherlock burst out after yet another theory about the young woman.

Watson gives him a look. Worried. She shouldn’t be. Not for him.

“It’s clear from the nature of his death that Peter Würtz was overpowered,” Sherlock explains, “Miss Ortega is a lot smaller than the late Mr. Würtz. Around 130 pounds to his 200? I find it very unlikely that she would get the upper hand in a physical contest, don’t you?”

“But she has motive,” one detective argues.

“And she’s not really a…” another begins. “I mean, she’s probably a lot stronger than a lot of women.”

“That’s not how hormones work, you imbecile!” Sherlock shouts.

Gregson grabs his arm and Watson is on her feet, as well.

“Sherlock…” Gregson says as he attempts to guide Sherlock away from the crowd. “”Maybe this is too personal-”

Sherlock, who has refused to be pushed away, interrupts him loudly and clearly:

“I assure you, captain, my judgement is not clouded by being transgender, quite the opposite. I see the situation much clearer than anyone else here.”

There’s some muttering at that, but Watson stares the assembled detectives down, ready to jump at Sherlock’s defense if needed. From anyone else, it’d be patronising. Sherlock can fight his own battles. He always has. But it’s Watson.

Gregson just sighs and gesticulates as if to say “go ahead, then”. Sherlock does just that.

 

It wasn’t the secretary - obviously - but a rival politician. It’s a big scandal. Sherlock doesn’t care. He goes around to see Miss Ortega. She’s fine. She has a new job. Sherlock rolls up his sleeve to show her the small trans symbol just under his shoulder. She hugs him; he let’s her. Turns out she knows more about political intrigues in this city than Sherlock would ever care to. He marks her down as a possible associate.

“Are you okay?” Watson asks, as Watsons are want to.

“Miss Ortega is doing well,” he tells her.

“You went to see her?”

Sherlock hums affirmatively.

Watson considers him for a bit. Being considered by Watson is the closest Sherlock has gotten to understanding how others feel when he looks them over for deductive purposes. People always tell him it’s uncomfortable. Sherlock doesn’t feel uncomfortable. He feels seen.

“You didn’t have to out yourself to the precinct,” she comments.

“Didn’t I?” Sherlock asks. “Those detectives were well on their way to charging an innocent woman just because of their preconceptions. They know I hear about most of their cases one way or the other and if knowing I’m transgender makes them think twice before pulling some unfortunate down to the station for being at the wrong place at the wrong time, I’m quite happy for them to know.”

Watson smiles. He has tea with Ms. Hudson a few days later and she smiles, too.

**Author's Note:**

> cishet sherlock holmes is as fake as neurotypical sherlock holmes
> 
> I'm at [ punk-solas](http://punk-solas.tumblr.com/) though i don't post a lot about Elementary


End file.
